Hi, everyone. This is the second article I've put up for Pee Review. The last one was pretty awful, but I hope this one would do better, even for a tiny bit. Anyway, here you go, feel free to give criticism of any kind, and thanks in advance.
The Warmonger 11:57, February 23, 2010 (UTC)

I'll get this one tomorrow. --ChiefjusticeWii 12:50, February 23, 2010 (UTC)

Hey...do you mind if I do this? I have a reviewing urge right now, and I know my review count has been a bit low, so I'm trying to do more but I can't believe the pee queue right now. ~14:05, Feb 24, 2010

Feel free, I was going to do it tonight, but it looks like I'm working instead, so thanks. --ChiefjusticeWii 14:06, February 24, 2010 (UTC)

Humour:

4

General Comments

Needs to be more over-the-top. For satire to work, you need some exaggeration, but not too much. You don't actually have many jokes or many parts that the reader could possibly find funny. While reading your article, I was reminded of Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine. I remembered that in a scene, Michael Moore went to a bank, where they gave free guns for opening an account. I think this kind of ironic humour would be good to aim for. This topic also strikes me as one that could use "juxtaposition" very well, ie: American citizens need to exercise their Second Amendment rights by bombing other countries (sorry if it's bad), to juxtapose "ideals" with "right wing crazies". I would assume that you are trying to satirise overzealous American gun enthusiasts (the right wing crazies), but I think the "satire" part is not done very well as it doesn't portray them in a humourous (and negative?) way as you potentially could.
Lead

I felt the lead is not very good, as there is not much substance. A good lead should sort of act like a lead in Wikipedia - summarise the concept, the running joke (which you also don't have), the style/persona, the context, and give the reader a good footing to start the article with. We do it in a more subtle way, but the most important thing is probably establishing "context". *A good question to ask yourself is: "What am I trying to portray gun-lovers as?", or "What makes gun-lovers funny?"

Early Years

I like "the alarming low number of American citizens wielding weapons to exercise their Second Amendment rights" - here "right" sort of turns into "obligation" - should have more like this. The "right" could turn into other things like "dominance".

I felt the Italian mob was a bit of a digression. Also don't understand why, "without armed immigrants, America will have no enemy to fight" - They always have: British, Spanish, Germans, Russians, Canadians, and many, many more.

WWII and Cold War

Why do I get the feeling that you're running out of jokes?

There seems to be something going on with the listing of weapons, which is a recurring thing, but nothing ever came out of it. I really don't know what you're trying to get at.

Some breaks in tone around this area.

Vietnam and Today

"Ammu-Nation is one of the official sponsors of the Vietnam War", implies that it sponsored the whole war, not just the Americans. Kinda like this. Implies that the gun company really likes war. Hope to see more of this kind of thing.

I'd like to see something about when the average American citizen can use those weapons that you listed. If you do this, it could be funny.

"Gaydar" - the idea that conservatives could search out gays to destroy is funny to me. Liberals and environmentalists should be next. It has a lot of untapped potential, unfortunately, you didn't develop anything from this, you just list it and move on.

Branches and Howto

Again, I think the main problem is a lack of consistency in jokes. In the beginning of the article it's like "guns and Americans are awesome!", then here it's like "Americans are fat etc".

However, I liked "users to buy guns directly in Facebook, and the option to send guns to their friends too while they're at it!"

Concept:

4

I think this might be your main problem, and your humour suffers because of this. I think you should spend sometime to do research, immerse yourself in the literature or watch some war films (or NRA meeting clips). Because I felt that you didn't nicely capture the "essence" of what you're trying to satirise. Many things are mentioned, but never developed. Your jokes are also not that consistent.

The thing is, the Americans who like guns are usually conservatives. Conservatives are known for their Christianity, capitalism and stupidity. Maybe you could consider linking these things together in your article.

Towards the end of the article, I got a hint of a concept that war is just a big video game sort of thing. This is not very clear, and if this is really your concept, you should establish it at the beginning of your article.

Prose and formatting:

7

My eyes are actually burning right now, I didn't spot any mistakes but I can't possibly proofread now. Proofreading service, blah blah blah. I can do it tomorrow night, if you're still up for it. A lot of red links around there, which don't look nice. Read the article out loud to yourself. This also helps you spot inconsistencies in tone, timing, choice of vocab and things.

Images:

6

The images are ok but it wouldn't hurt to make them bigger. I think the first image is quite good. Don't know if you made that but it summarises all the aspects that you should be covering in this article: "Helped beat communism" - guns didn't actually beat communism, but guns are patriotic, and beating communism is patriotic, so guns beat communism. Should try to have some of these ridiculous association humour in the article, as the media uses this a lot without meaning it to be funny. Also "liberal pinkos" - develop the idea of how the conservatives hate the liberals, and the stereotype of conservatives and liberals. Note that it says "1978", but your article says "1901". A lot of your images are from games, which was what made me thought that that was your concept. I don't think those images are high quality or very funny, so unless it's your concept, I'd rather you change them to real people. The others are ok as they just illustrate what you talked about.

Miscellaneous:

5.5

So, the most important thing is to get your concept together and follow it through.

Final Score:

26.5

I felt like this review was more abstract that my usual ones. If you don't understand it, ask me on my talk page.